Once in a while, we hear in the news a case of corporal punishment in school.
This is despite the fact this physical and emotional punishment has been outlawed in Fiji, which many people believe has led to widespread ill-discipline and misbehaviour among young people. On one end of the debate are people such as Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama, who believes corporal punishment will never be introduced as a form discipline for children.
Around this time last year, while talking to members of the Tailevu Provincial Council, he emphasised that disciplining children should start from the home and should be non-violent. Taking a zero tolerance stance, the ministry has been consistently enforcing its anti-corporal punishment policy for many years. As a result, in 2018 alone, 33 teachers were taken to task because they inflicted corporal punishment on their pupils in schools. There are some Fijians who belong to the old school of thinking and would gladly uphold corporal punishment.
They’d normally say things like “because we got a spanking we learned from our mistakes and changed for the better”. Some would go one step further and stress “students of today have no discipline because they no longer get the stick”. Corporal punishment means using physical force on a child for the purpose of controlling his or her correction. In Fiji, it is a criminal offence and is contrary to provisions of the 2013 Constitution.
In one of its researches, UNICEF suggested that worldwide around six in 10 children aged between two and 14 were subjected to corporal punishment by a caregiver. Furthermore, there have been many debates over the effects of corporal punishment on children’s wellbeing. As early as 2002, there was a research conducted by American academic E.T. Gershoff. This research concluded that physical punishment often led to various negative outcomes for children including “child aggression, lower levels of moral internalisation and poorer mental health”.
A revised research further added “antisocial behaviour, external behaviour problems, low moral internalisation, aggression, mental health problems, negative parent–child relationships, impaired cognitive ability, low self-esteem and risk of physical abuse from parents”. Other fi ndings by experts indicate there is an association between the use of spanking and the risk of physical abuse, and corporal punishment and physical abuse are both affi liated with similar, negative child outcomes. That is, being physically punished as a child is linked with being more supportive of using corporal punishment as an adult. This week there were media reports on the alleged cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment of four students in Tailevu.
As a result, a few staff members of the school concerned were suspended and are currently under investigation. Minister for Education, Rosy Akbar was quick to say that teachers who used corporal punishment would be out of the ministry in no time. While I admire her swift response and agree that teachers who abuse children under their care need to be taken to task, they nevertheless need to be given a fair go. Corporal punishment aside, I believe disciplining students should begin at home.
We should not leave this for teachers when children go to school because it is simply not their job and prime responsibility. Teachers’ job is to teach subjects to children and not to primarily instil discipline. Some parents fail miserably to discipline their children but expect teachers to do it for them. Some even blame teachers for their children’s failure in school while they spend all their spare time attending to other family, work and community obligations.
The recent talk this week on child indiscipline and physical and emotional punishment is neither new nor will it be the last time to be reported in the media. To control it, will require a concerted effort from every stakeholder involved – the parents, teachers, school management, teacher unions, the ministry, parent and teacher associations and so forth. More aggressive awareness sessions and campaigns from the ministry and civil society are needed to ensure that corporal punishment is never viewed as a form of discipline for children.
While every effort needs to be made to ensure teachers are aware of the law and policies on corporal punishment, students on other hand need to be reminded of their responsibility as students and the immense expectations from their parents and families.
I believe many a time, children have been taught to understand their rights under the law but little emphasis is ever made, if any, to make them understand their responsibilities under these rights. Also while we emphasise on the fact that physical and emotional punishment are not to be inflicted upon the children, parents and caregivers should be made to understand other forms of disciplining children. Many adults do not know about these alternative forms that are non-violent in nature. Churches are also a big influencer of adult thinking around corporal punishment.
To many Christian adults, children are to be “not spared the rod” if they are to achieve discipline. There is room for serious discussions in church circles and among church members about the need for non-violent forms of disciplining young ones in line with the tenets of mercy, grace and infi nite compassion espoused by Christ.
Counselling support should be available to both students and teachers in secondary and primary schools and for this to happen we need more trained counsellors in our rural and urban schools. The bottom line is the maintenance of order and discipline in a child’s life is important part of a young person’s development.
It is never easy and there are no short cuts. While the criminalisation of corporal punishment continues to be made part of modern day society and communities, we must understand that it has been a contentious issue for many generations.
We definitely need to have more conversation and debate around the topic, especially as it becomes a growing concern in the family and in our institutions of learning.
Until we meet on this same page same time next week, stay blessed, stay healthy and stay safe.
